


From Bond, With Love

by satan_cans_his_vegetables



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies), SPECTRE (2015), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: 00Q - Freeform, Angst, M/M, enjoy your feels friends, this one's gonna hurt like hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-14
Updated: 2015-11-25
Packaged: 2018-05-01 12:50:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5206541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/satan_cans_his_vegetables/pseuds/satan_cans_his_vegetables
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Q and Bond had never been anything of substance. Their relationship had been a series of reckless one night stands and (mostly) unrequited love, with quiet midnight whispers of affection thrown in the mix. Q knew his feelings were far stronger than they ought to have been.</p>
<p>Bond is killed in an explosion. Q finds a series of letters and postcards that Bond left for him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

**Day One:**  
_“Bond, stop, No. You have to get out of there immediately, the evac team is outside.”_  
**_“There’s still civilians inside, Q.”_**  
_“You’re not going to be able to get out in time. The building is going to blow. Get out, 007.”_  
**_“I’m not leaving until they’re safe.”_**  
_“Damn it, Bond! You don’t have time for this! You have seventeen seconds to get out before this building is levelled.”_  
**_“I can’t leave them in here. Turn off the comms, Q. I’ll be alright.”_**  
_“No, James, I can’t leave you there to die.” _  
**_“Q-”_**__

The sound of the explosion ringing through the mic before static took over was something he could never forget. Bond’s vitals had dropped from the screen immediately following the explosion, leaving Q standing there, wide eyed, staring at the flatlines in front of him. He didn’t know how long he had stood there for. He only remembered moving once Moneypenny had come in and ever so gently taken his arm, as if he was a gun just moments away from going off..

“You should go home, Q.” She had said. “We’ll deal with this.”

Q had shook his head and kept his steadily shaking hands on his keyboard. There was work to be done, there was cleanup to be initiated, he couldn’t leave now. He had opened his mouth to protest, but Eve had just squeezed his arm lightly and pulled him away from the desk.

“Go home and rest. I’ll come by later on to check on you.” 

He had picked up his bag and left his office. Everyone had known enough to keep their distance from the young man for fear that he might fall apart all at once. By the time Q had gotten home off the tube, the realization had set in that for the first time since he had met the man, Bond would not be coming back.

**Day Four:**

It rained on the day of his funeral. Q had expected this. A day as somber as this one had deserved miserable weather. They hadn’t been able to recover a body from the wreckage of the building, so the casket in front of Q was empty. Then again, so was most of the church. The only people to show up were fellow colleagues from MI6 and the Skyfall groundskeeper Kincade. Q did his best to keep tears from spilling over, but by the time the funeral had ended, he was a wreck. Of course, the little voice in the back of his head told him he needed to calm down. 

Q and Bond had never been anything of substance. Their relationship had been a series of reckless one night stands and (mostly) unrequited love, with quiet midnight whispers of affection thrown in the mix. Q knew his feelings were far stronger than they ought to have been. After all, Bond was just that, he was Bond, and that meant there were no stable relationships of any sort. There was merely an endless string of women and occasional drunken nights with his Quartermaster.

Moneypenny walked over to him and stood in silence for a moment as they both regarded the empty casket at the front of the room. There were a few photos of Bond there. There was his headshot from work, childhood photos that Q had never seen before, and one particular one that almost made him smile. Q remembered it well. He had taken it one evening after they had both gotten ridiculously drunk, and Bond had been laughing. It was a rare glimpse at a happy man, something that was never synonymous with James. He was often melancholy and stern and absolutely nothing else. Though when they had been alone, James came alive as another person all together.

“I doubt he ever said it, but he loved you.” She said quietly. Q cleared his throat and nodded.  
“I like to think he did. Perhaps it’s foolish of me, but it was one of the few things that kept me optimistic.” His voice was oddly calm and serene, given that his heart had nearly stopped beating and his chest felt so tight that even breathing was a difficulty.  
“It’s not foolish at all.” She smiled a little sadly. “They’re reading his will tomorrow, are you going to be there? M said you were mentioned.” Moneypenny looked up at him.  
“Yes. I suppose I don’t really have a choice.” He sighed. “This means I have to accept that he’s gone, doesn’t it?” Q asked softly.  
“I think it does.”

She took his hand, and for once, he didn’t flinch away. He just held her hand a little tighter and braced himself against the coming onslaught of debilitating loneliness.

**Day Five:**  
**_“Turn off the comms, Q. I’ll be alright.”_**  
_“No, James, I can’t leave you in there to die.”_  
**_“Q-”_**

He woke with a choked off gasp. Q’s hands were fisted into the sheets and his face was wet with tears. Both of his cats lay at the foot of the bed staring up at him, as if questioning his erratic behaviour. He sat up and reached for his glasses. Q observed the gentle quaking of his hand and slowly clenched it into a fist. Ever since Bond’s death, the tremors had not stopped. He had a nagging suspicion that perhaps they never would. The clock on his bedside table read 2:16am, far earlier than Q wanted to be awake, but he knew that the chance of him getting back to sleep was slim. 

As he wiped his eyes and drew his knees up to his chest, he knew that all he wanted was for Bond to hold him as he used to when the nightmares struck, to quietly calm him and whisper over and over that he was okay. But Q had enough sense to know that no matter how much he pretended it was alright without him, nothing would ever be the same again, and he was left to combat the terror of early morning panic on his own.


	2. Two

**Day Six:**  
Q did not sleep after the nightmare. He couldn’t bear the thought of hearing the conversation yet again, as he did so commonly in his dreams. Sleep had become something of a torment that Q did not feel the need to subject himself to. Instead, he had sat awake with his cats and slipped one of Bond’s forgotten sweaters over his head. He had cried, then he had calmed, and then he had buried his face in the fabric and cried again. Eventually, Q had become so numb that he just sat there and stared at the wall. He did not move until the sun rose.

Q shifted the cat from his lap and got to his feet once his alarm went off. He walked into the bathroom and caught a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror, trying not to cringe at the ghostly reflection staring back at him. His eyes were ringed with dark bruise coloured circles and his cheeks looked more sunken in than usual. His skin was sallow. Q sighed and shuffled out of the bathroom and into the kitchen. He didn’t really want to go to the will reading, because he needed to heal. He couldn’t do that if every time he turned around, the memory of Bond confronted him like an old friend. However, he also couldn’t just stay home and wallow in his mourning. Q had to carry on.

He leaned against the counter and hung his head for a moment, feeling one of the cats wind itself around his leg. The silence of the room was suffocating. Normally, in the mornings after their nights together, Bond would be in the kitchen making breakfast. He would hum out of tune with a song on the radio and smile in the special way he reserved just for Q, but when Q looked up today, he saw only the emptiness of his flat. He squeezed his eyes shut against a fresh wave of tears and bit down hard on his lip to stop any sobs from escaping. It was breaking him.

His doorbell rang and he opened his eyes to go answer it. On the other side of the door was Moneypenny.

“Oh, Q…” She took in his appearance. He was sickly, tears soaked his cheeks, and he was swimming in a sweater far too big to be his own. She knew. She always did. “Come here.” Eve reached up and pulled him into a hug. Q fell apart. A near wail of a sob escaped him as he clung to her desperately. She quietly soothed him and hummed under her breath in an attempt to perhaps get him to relax slightly. 

“I’m not ready. I can’t. Eve, I can’t.” Q whispered.  
“Yes you can, Q. You have to. I’m sorry.” She held him at arm's length and looked at him. “He wouldn’t want you to be like this, you know that. Bond would want you to carry on.”  
“I’m not ready. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.” He shook his head and took a step back.  
“I know, Q. But this is how it happened, and you can’t change that now. You just have to accept it.”

\----- ----- -----

He had left Q a note. He had spent a great amount of time just staring at the envelope with the scrawled letter Q on the back. Q didn’t want to know what was inside, but if Bond had left it for him, he had to open it. Hesitantly, he reached out and picked it up from the table. He opened it with shaking fingers and read the letter inside.

_Dear Q,  
I have a nagging suspicion that this will not end well, so this letter was necessary. I don’t know if I’ll be coming home. In the event that I do, you will not be reading this. If I do not, then here you are. _

_I will not be sentimental and waste your time. In this envelope there are two keys, one to my house and one to something in my house that I want you to have. It’s a safe behind the only photo on the wall in my bedroom. It belongs to you. I’d like you to be the one to pack up my things, if you could. I don’t trust M to be careful with everything. You can keep whatever you’d like. I won’t be needing it anymore. Ask Moneypenny and she’ll tell you where to put everything, she did this for me after Skyfall._

_I’m sorry we didn’t have longer._

_J. Bond_

Q set the letter down and tilted the envelope on its side, dropping two keys into his palm. One was larger, obviously the house key, and the other was small and hanging on a frayed bit of string with a tag labelled ‘Q’ on the end of it. It must have been for the safe. He set them both on the coffee table and got to his feet. He hadn’t yet bothered to change out of what he had worn to the will reading. Q would have rather been in Bond’s old sweater than anything else he owned. It brought him the smallest amount of comfort. He fished through his pockets to find his phone and texted Moneypenny.

_I need your help with something. Q_

**_What is it? Are you alright? EM_ **

_I have to go to Bond’s flat. There’s something I need to get. Q_

**_M is sending agents to pack and clear it. EM_ **

_Call them off. Bond’s asked me to do it. Q ___

**_Conflict of interest, don’t you think? EM_ **

_I don’t care. Q_

**_Fine. You owe me. EM_ **

 

For the first time in nearly a week, Q had energy. He didn’t want to just sit around and mope, he had something to do, something important, and that made all the difference. He picked up his bag and gently placed the two keys inside before leaving his flat and hurrying down to the tube station. On the way there, he mulled over some of his favourite memories with Bond. 

There was the night they went for dinner at the sleepy Italian restaurant that Q had suggested. It had been full, but Bond had used some carefully timed charm and wit to get a table. The two of them had hardly eaten anything, they’d just talked for hours while drinking scotch. They only left when their waiter came over to tell them the restaurant was closing. 

There was the time that Bond had taken Q out dancing. Bond had just come home from Russia and showed up at his doorstep in a suit with a bottle of wine. He brought Q to a party and taught him how to waltz on the dance floor, then the two of them had danced the night away. Bond had stayed that night, and Q had had to hide the marks on his neck, though other agents had given him knowing smiles when they’d seen him the next day.

And perhaps Q’s favourite memory of all had happened just last week. They had spent the night in at Bond’s flat watching horrendously awful romance movies and eating take out. Q was not normally one for fancy evenings and fine wine, he was perfectly content with a ratty old sofa and cheap Chinese food. All that mattered was that James was with him and that he was happy. 

Q swallowed past the tightness in his throat as a pang of sadness gripped his heart. He would not be spending evenings like that any more. And for what was possibly the first time in his life, Q felt utterly and completely alone.


	3. Three

**Day Six:**  
He stood in the hall outside of Bond’s flat with the key held in his hand. The metal bit into the skin of his palm as his grip slowly tightened. Q wasn’t sure this was the best idea. He shook his head and steeled himself, putting the key in the lock and slowly turning it before opening the door. The room smelled musty, though Bond had only been gone for two weeks at the most. He stepped in and closed the door quietly behind him. The sound echoed. Bond had never been one for unpacking and getting comfortable, everyone knew that, yet still Q had not been prepared for the emptiness that filled the room. Boxes were stacked in corners, and the few pieces of furniture Bond possessed were stationed in the living room.

Q walked through in silence, shaking hands clenched into fists. It was too unnerving. He paused outside the bedroom door for a moment. The whole house had a suffocating feeling of abandonment, how could anyone have ever lived here? He creaked open the bedroom door and was surprised to find that of all of the rooms in the house, this one looked lived in. The bed sheets were rumpled and pulled back as if someone had slept there recently, and for a moment Q felt hope, but it was diminished within moments as he sat on the edge of the bed and a cloud of dust erupted. James was dead.

He pulled the smaller key from his pocket and turned it over in his fingers. Q lifted his eyes and scanned the walls for the photo referred to in Bond’s letter. He found it above the dresser, and his chest clenched painfully. The only photo he had on his wall was a sun-faded one of the two of them in Q’s office. Q was bent over his computer and smiling up at him while Bond leaned against the desk with his hands in his pockets. Moneypenny had taken it without their knowing. Neither of them had admitted to any sort of feelings at that point, but everyone else knew. They could tell that, for some reason, Q was different. He meant more to the agent than any of the women from past missions, and the way Q tensed when Bond was required to seduce someone was telling enough. 

Q carefully removed the photo from the wall and set it on the table. He ran his fingers over the frame and rested them over Bond for a moment before looking back up at the wall. There was a square hole, slightly smaller than the frame, and inside was a safe. Q took the small key and unlocked it, opening it slowly. There was a stack of what looked to be paper bound with brown string. He took it from the safe and returned to his spot on the bed. On the top of the stack was another envelope with a Q scrawled onto the back of it. He smiled to himself and untied the string, setting it aside, before gently tracing a single fingertip across the letter. Bond had written him letters. He opened the first one and unfolded the paper carefully so as not to rip it.

 

_Q,_  
_Over the last two years, I have been many places, and have made an attempt to get you a postcard from every place I’ve been. I’ve never given them to you, though I probably should have, so in the event that something happens to me, here they are. There is only one key to this safe, and it’s yours now. Don’t lose it._  
_J. Bond_

His vision blurred with tears as he read the letter. God, he missed him. Q set the paper aside and pressed the heels of his palms into his eyes for a moment to stop himself from crying. He had to get it together. 

He took a deep breath and picked up the next item in the pile, which was a postcard with a photo of the Bolshoi theatre on the front. It read ‘Greetings From Moscow’ in blocky, garish letters. He turned it over and read the note on the back.

_I’ll take you here to watch a ballet someday._

_From Bond, with love._

Q closed his eyes and imagined for a brief span of time that he and Bond were sat in the grand old theatre watching a ballet on stage. He imagined how calm and beautiful it would be, and it was enough to make him smile. The next postcard was from Mumbai, with a photo of Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus in all its glory. Q smiled and shook his head, eyes flickering to the familiar handwriting.

 

_Q? Get on the train._

_From Bond, with love._

He couldn’t help himself, he’d laughed at that. Bond had always held some resentment towards Q after the train incident while chasing Silva. Q had found it amusing, even more so now. The next one he looked at was a photo of the Great Wall of China. It was the kind of postcard you saw in every shop no matter where you were. He turned it over and was immediately surprised by the dried drops of blood splattered along the back of it. Written in hurried black pen was another message.

_You would love the view here. I did too, until someone tried to shove me off. Sorry for the blood._

_From Bond, with love._

Q spent the next few hours reading over the postcards and short letters that Bond had left him. The final count was forty six postcards and thirty two letters, all signed with ‘From Bond, with love’. He didn’t mind. Once he had finished reading them, he sat back against the headboard and closed his eyes. For the last few hours, Q had felt at peace. The crippling sadness that he had felt for the last few days had had a brief respite, and for that, Q was grateful. He opened his eyes and looked towards Bond’s closet. He got to his feet and wandered over, finding a sweater and pulling it on over his tea stained cardigan before returning to the bed and curling up in a ball. Everything around him smelled like Bond, like teakwood, aftershave and gunpowder. It smelled like home.

He left the letters at the foot of the bed and buried his face in the sheets around him as if to soak up as much of Bond as possible. Q did not want to go home. He wanted to stay here with the letters and Bond’s bed and keep the memory of him alive for as long as he could. If he could just remember what he smelled like, what his handwriting looked like, then perhaps it would be like he’d never been gone at all. Q could not allow himself to forget. With that in mind, he brought the sheets up over him and turned out the light, letting the darkness and memories of passionate nights with Bond envelop him.


	4. Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for blood and death. I'm sorry. Please don't kill me.

**Day Seven: ******

It had been one week. Yesterday had been significantly better than all the rest, what with the letters and postcards. It had made Q feel almost okay. Almost as if, for the first time in a week, his body wasn’t dependent on the last scarce bits of memory he had left of Bond to get him through. He had something new, and that gave him a little more energy.

He had returned to work on the seventh day since Bond’s death, much to M’s chagrin. He had tried to keep Q away from MI6 for as long as possible, but it was inevitable that he would return far too early with far too little care towards his own well being. He was much like Bond in that respect.

Other agents had stopped and stared at him. The ones in Q Branch had at least tried to be subtle. When he had walked in, they had all kept their heads down, though Q was not stupid. He knew they were all questioning why he was back. He could hear their quiet whispering following him down the hallway and into his office until he had shut the door behind him. He set his bag on the chair and removed the stack of postcards. The air in the room felt heavy and tense, more so than it should have been. Such a familiar space had come to feel abandoned without the sarcastic banter through the comms. In the thick atmosphere, Q sat down at his desk and wrote. Instead of his usual feverishly typed notes, he picked up a pen and a pad of sticky notes, plucking one of the postcards from the pile (a Day of the Dead scene from Mexico) and writing out a short response to it. He then stuck the note to the card and set it aside.

For the next few hours, he methodically responded to every postcard with a note, until he had finally reached the letter on top. For that he would need more than a sticky note. He fished through his drawer until he found a notepad and began to write once more. Q did not know how long he had been writing before Moneypenny had come into his office with a cup of tea. She eyed the stack of postcards with a slight sigh.  
   “Q, maybe it’s too early…”  
   “I really wish you would all stop saying that. I’m perfectly capable of doing my job, Eve. This isn’t the first agent I’ve lost.” Q said sharply.  
   “Yes, but this is different,” she said softly, “-you know it is. He wasn’t just an agent to you.” Eve set the mug down on the table and sat on the edge of his desk. Q felt inclined to ask her to leave, but he didn’t. She was right. He knew she was right. Q was just too stubborn to admit it.  
  “I can do my job, Moneypenny.” He muttered and went back to writing the letter. Eve picked up one of the postcards and lifted the sticky note out of the way with her finger to read the inscription. She lowered it again and looked at Q.  
  “You can’t do this to yourself. It’s going to eat you alive. You have to accept that he’s gone.” She murmured. Q snatched the postcard out of her hand and set it back with the rest of them, as if she’d burn them with her touch.  
  “I know he’s gone. I’m doing this so I can move on. I need peace, and this is going to give it to me. So if you’d be so kind as to let me get back to writing.” Q looked back at his page. Moneypenny slid off the desk and walked back to the door to leave him in silence. He felt slightly bad for what had just happened, but at the same time he felt nothing at all. In the last week, he had felt so empty and numb that no emotion would register at all.

With the final letter finished, he folded it up and wrote ‘Bond’ across the back in his loopy handwriting and set it on top of the stack of postcards. He tied it up again with the brown string and set it in a drawer of his desk where no one would ever read them. Perhaps now he would get the closure he so desperately needed, and he could move on with his life. Maybe, just maybe.

The rest of the day passed dreadfully slowly. It was a mess of post mission reports and paperwork from ages ago that Q had been ignoring but had no choice but to face now. At least it was distracting. As soon as he was allowed to, Q packed up and left the building. A few agents nodded in his direction as he walked out, and Q gave a small tight lipped smile in response, but he did not feel the need to be vocal. They would leave him to his mourning. He walked out into the crisp night air and took a deep breath to cleanse himself of the recycled oxygen filtering through MI6. There was something about the night that was so refreshingly beautiful. Q passed buildings and lampposts and cars on his way to the tube station, nothing out of the ordinary, except for the men tailing about ten feet behind him. They’d followed every turn and shortcut Q had taken for the past ten minutes. He instinctively dipped down a side alley, horrified to find that it was a dead end. He was trapped. The men closed in on him.  
  “Who are you?” Q’s hands tightened on the strap of his bag.  
  “You’re 007’s Quartermaster.” One of the men responded, and the other clasped a rag over his mouth and nose. Q fought against him and tried to get away, but he became drowsy and slowly slumped to the ground, unconscious.

Q awoke with a throbbing pain in his head. He squinted his eyes against the light around him and looked down at his arms to find them tied to a chair. His legs were just the same. Q raised his head to look at the shadowy doorframe before him. He knew someone was there. He could feel it.  
  “Why am I here?” He rasped. To his surprise, the shadow in the door moved towards him.  
  “You’re 007’s Quartermaster.” It was an unfamiliar voice, a deep one laced with malice.  
  “I was. 007 is dead.” Q glared up at him. “He’s been dead for a week now, but I suspect you know that already.” He tightened his hands into fists, his wrists straining against the rope holding him down.  
  “It’s a shame, really. James Bond had some valuable information, you see, and you’re the only other person who knows it.” The man leaned down in front of Q. He was a strong featured man, his breath stank of vodka. Q turned his head away.  
  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Q said through clenched teeth. The man struck him hard across the face, hard enough to send his head rocking back on his shoulders. Q slumped forward, spitting blood on the floor, tears burning the back of his eyes.  
  “Lies. I’ll give you one more chance. What did Bond tell you before the explosion?” The man held the arms of the chairs and leaned closer to Q. He hung his head so as not to see the man.  


  “He told me nothing.” Q recalled Bond’s voice, how frantic it had sounded when he had said Q’s name just moments before the building exploded. There was the distinct sound of a gun being cocked, and Q raised his head enough to see a Beretta just inches away from his eyes. His pulse skyrocketed, but his face did not betray him.  
  “If you don’t tell me, Q, I just might have to kill you. Maybe that will bring old 007 out of hiding, hm? Do you think that would get his attention, his beloved little Quartermaster being shot point blank in the middle of the night with no one around to save him?” His voice slowly raised in volume. Q tugged against the rope once again.  
  “Bond didn’t tell me anything. He tried to, the building went up before he could.” He muttered.  
  “Wrong answer.” Q felt the cold metal pressed to his forehead and he squeezed his eyes shut. Go on then, he thought, pull the trigger. For a moment, everything was quiet, calm even, until the shot rang out. Q’s head rocked back once again and blood splattered the wall and floor behind him. His eyes, lifeless as they now were, stared up at the ceiling. He was at peace.


	5. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this marks the end of my first multi-chapter. Short and sweet to cap off the story.

**Day One:**

Moneypenny was sent to clean out his office. It would forever remain the hardest thing she had ever done. Surprisingly, M had come in to help her after a while. There was a somber feeling throughout Q Branch, and everyone was feeling the absence. 

They had recovered Q’s body after midnight, and no one had slept since then. They’d lost two important people in the span of one week, and the hole in the collective heart of MI6 was unavoidable. Eve had boxed up his belongings, save for one stack of postcards she recovered from his desk drawer. Those needed to be handled differently. Those were special. She shared a long glance with M, who looked like he hadn’t slept in days, and taped up the final box from Q’s desk. Another sealed fate at the hands of MI6.

**Day Two:**

The man had been right. Bond had come out of hiding. 

He received word that Q had been killed, and he had just walked back into his old life. He entered M’s office, and the man regarded him like he’d just seen a ghost. Bond merely kept his stony expression and asked to see Q’s body. 

Eve had slapped him. He knew he deserved it. She had yelled at him for what he had done to everyone, especially to Q, and Bond did not argue. He only spoke when necessary. M had taken him down to see Q’s body, and though his expression did not change, the sight of the dead boy (still so young, so youthful, so much left yet to live for) put a vice grip on his heart. The hole clean through his forehead made Bond’s stomach clench in panic. This was all his fault, and he knew it. If he hadn’t gone away, neither would have Q.

Bond had spent the better part of three hours getting yelled at once again by Moneypenny. Again, Bond did not protest. He stood in Q’s office, as empty as it now was, and let her vent all of her anger towards him. Bond had put them through too much too fast, that much he knew for certain. It was written all over their faces, M looked as if he’d aged ten years in the last seven days, and Eve was ready to tear Bond’s heart out through his chest. 

  “He left you these.” Eve narrowed her eyes and pushed the neat stack of postcards into Bond’s hands. “And you can take his cats, too.” She turned and walked out of the office, closing the door with more force than necessary behind her. Bond sat down in the chair and untied the fraying string. They were the cards he had left Q in the safe. He sifted through some of them and found the sticky notes attached with Q’s familiar and messy handwriting scratched all over them. He found the card of the Bolshoi Theatre and glanced at the tiny yellow square attached to it. ‘I would love to. I’ll book the tickets, don’t be late.’ It read. Bond smiled softly and shook his head.

He opened the letter next, eyes skimming over the words until he finally reached the bottom. He felt his heart lurch into his throat as he read the final line.

_‘From Q, With Love.’_


End file.
